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Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Happy Valentine's Day

Every year I get up on my Valentine's Day soapbox to remind everyone that love doesn't just mean love between you and your significant other. It encompasses everyone who is special in your life. The people who make your day, and yet go unsung 364 days of the year.

Like sending in treats to Thatboy's coworkers.

And that includes each and every one of you, dear readers! Thanks for hanging in there this past year with my sporadic updates and general nonsense. Which is really what this blog is all about. General nonsense.

Thatbaby echos my sentiments.

This year we are spending Valentine's Day at home - our first time in years. It just doesn't make sense to pack up the baby to struggle with crowds. We go out to dinner other times (like this past Saturday night.) And there will be plenty more dinners out in our future.

Instead we're staying in and I'm making a nice dinner:

Blood Orange Cocktails

Steamed Crab

Baked Potatoes

Caesar Salad

Lord Baltimore Cake

There will be recipes to follow in the coming weeks, but instead I'll share a different crab recipe with you. Crab is cheap and sweet right now, one of the reasons we're having it for Valentine's Day dinner. (And it always seems like a special occasion type food to me anyway.) While perfect for salads (especially those winter salads I wrote about yesterday), crab is a fabulous way to use up any wontons you might have leftover from, I dunno, pumpkin ravioli you made last week?

Crab rangoons couldn't be easier to make, since the ingredients are really just crab and cream cheese. Stuffed in a won ton, and then deep fried. Sounds good, right? Well I mean, anything that's deep fried is probably going to bed delicious by default. It's also probably not going to fit into that New Year's Diet Resolution you've been trying to keep. So I did what I usually do with typically fried foods - I baked it!

Same basic idea - but you want the heat in the oven to be nice and high so those suckers get crispy. Thatboy was highly enamored with these, so I see them making their way onto our menu as a regular way to use up won ton wrappers.